CSc 302 Homework Assignments
Homework #1
1. Using the table of contents of the textbook, determine in
which chapter each issue would most probably be found. (Provide
the chapter number and optionally the chapter title). If an issue is
not relevant to any chapter, put "none."
- What is the "carbon footprint" of Spam?
- Can your employer monitor your email?
- Why was Skype service interrupted for 24 hours?
- Are electric cars really better for the environment?
- How much does Google know about your web surfing?
- Why does my bank keep sending me email asking for my account
password?
- Why does my Cal Poly password have to be so complicated?
- Why should I buy organic bananas?
- To what country does the U.S. ship most of its junk computers?
- Does Windows really get more viruses than Linux?
- Would you use Verizon's "Chaperone" cell phone service to track
your children?
- Will the supreme court overturn California's ban on violent video
games?
- Should I insist on a paper ballot and avoid computer voting in
the next election?
- Is illegal music downloading really affecting music sales?
Homework 2
Decide on a topic for your oral presentation.
(You may change your mind later with instructor approval).
Come to class prepared to sign up for a time slot when you desire to
present.
Next time, have a short homework to create a list of new
vocabulary words you discovered while reading the Computer Basics
article.
Homework 3
Follow the directions in this walkthrough
to install Dropbox on your personal computer. The directions
are for Windows, but they should be very similar for Mac.
If you don't have a personal computer see the instructor
for an alternate assignment. Feel free to visit
the instructor during office hours if you want technical assistance.
There is nothing to submit for this assignment.
Homework 4
Read two short articles with opposing views on privacy.
The
Eternal
Value
of
Privacy by Bruce Schneier (in Wired magazine)
Why
Privacy Doesn't Matter by "Vago" (blog poster)
For each article create a numbered list of the main points each author
makes in their article. For each point, attempt to
associate it with one of the categories in the instructor's list here:
Why
privacy matters. Explain in one sentence why you think it
belongs in that category.
Extra Credit 1
Find an article that gives a better argument for why privacy
is not necessary than the one cited above. Write a summary of
the main points of the article and a short explanation
of why you think it's a good argument. Submit a printout of the article
(including citation) and your summary.
Homework 5
Suppose a small political party strongly opposes an existing
law, for example, the income tax or the law against smoking
marijuana. Consider the possibility of allowing government
agencies like the IRS or the FBI to use the voter-registration database
(which includes a person's party affiliation in some states) to
initiate investigations of party members to see whether they are
breaking existing laws. Give arguments in favor of this; give
arguments in opposition. Which side you think has the stronger
argument? Why?
Clarifying notes:
- When the problem says "party members" it is NOT referring to
candidates for public office. It just means some citizen who is
registered to vote for that party.
- In reality there is no national, centralized voter-registration
database. But imagine that there is just for the problem.
- "Voter registration" is NOT voting history. It says nothing about
how a person has voted. It only says who is registered to vote.
- Most voter registration forms ask for the person's Social
Security number and an email address.
- The privacy of voter registration records varies from state to
state.
Some states sell registration records to political parties or
commercial
data vendors. Most people don't realize this, assuming the data
is used for activities directly
related to the election process such as mailing absentee ballots.
Homework 6
Read the article Big
Brother
is
searching
you. Summarize the author's main
points. Do you think the author's concerns are justified?
Discuss.
Homework 7
Watch this 10-minute
video by the Federal Trade Commission
about Identity Theft.
Write a list of the important points
in the video. (Bullet point style okay).
(Max 1 page).
Optional: Feedback for instructor (due Fri Feb 10)
You are invited to provide feedback to the instructor with suggestions
for improvement for the remainder of the course.
You are welcome to comment on aspects of the class
that you are enjoying or you think are particularly
worthwhile. If you think there is something that
could be changed that would improve your learning
please give specific details.
You may send a regular email or you may use
the instructor's anonymous
feedback
form if you prefer to remain anonymous.
(Optional) Extra Credit Homework
(due by 2/8)
Read the article Data
Mining
101:
Finding
Subversives
with
Amazon
Wishlists. Was the author's underlying purpose really to find
subversives? If not what was he trying to demonstrate? Summarize
the experiment and the conclusions in your own words. Write a
critique describing the strong and weak points of the article.
Briefly share your own opinions on the issue of data mining by the
government. (Limit two pages).
(Note: To the best of my knowledge the author violated no laws in
carrying out his experiment.)
(Note: You can ignore the computer commands the
author provides explaining the details of his experiment.)
Homework #8
For each item below, write yes or no to indicate whether or not it is
covered by copyright protection and explain why.
1.
- The novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee published in 1960.
- The play "Romeo and Juliet" written by Shakespeare a long time
ago.
- The motion picture "Modern Times" with Charlie Chaplin published
in 1936.
- A home "how to" video I made showing proper technique for cooking
an omelot.
- The process for creating Coca-Cola beverage.
- A photograph I took of the asphalt pavement in front of my house.
- A color crayon drawing made by your nephew in pre-school.
- A list of the names of the colors of the rainbow.
- The Telephone Book published by Pacific Bell.
- A list of anagrams of the word "superstitious".
- A table of the value of the mathematical constant pi with one
thousand decimal places.
- A photograph of a thousand piece jigsaw puzzle you assembled
yourself.
- A video you made of the performers at a rock concert.
- A Sears catalog from 1910.
- The label from a bottle of Perrier water.
- A photograph of the Andromeda galaxy taken by the Hubble
telescope and posted on the NASA web site. (tricky)
For each item below, write yes or no to indicate whether it would be
allowed under the "Fair Use" provision of copyright law and explain
why.
(Optionally,
you may write which section of "Fair Use" applies).
2.
- Share your copy of Surfer magazine among 12 of your friends so
they can
read an article you liked.
- Make 12 photocopies of the magazine and mail them to friends who
do not
live nearby.
- Make 12 photocopies of the one article and mail it to friends who
do
not live nearby.
- Scan the article to create a digital copy and email it to 12
friends.
3.
- A college professor clips out a newspaper article and posts it
on the
bulletin board outside her office door for any member of the campus
community to read.
- A college professor makes 30 photocopies of a newspaper article
from
that day's paper and distributes it to students in class to read and
discuss.
- A college professor scans a newspaper article and posts it on her
Web
page.
4.
- You invite 3 friends over to your house to watch a DVD movie you
rented
on your large screen display.
- You rent a DVD movie and an LCD projector and display the movie
on the
blank wall next to a parking lot in downtown SLO.
- You buy a copy of a documentary movie that reveals the tragedy of
child soldiers in Uganda. You invite the public to attend a
showing of
the movie at the city library and charge $2 admission. You give
all
the revenue to a charitable organization trying to stop the war in
Uganda.
5.
- You purchase a music CD recording of your favorite artist
performing in
concert. You decide the applause is annoying so you use a music
editing program to create an MP3 with the applause removed.
- You post your creation (the edited version) on the web at a music
file
sharing site for others to listen to.
6.
- Your sister got married and is having a baby. She found an
article on how to choose a name for your new child in a parenting
magazine. She makes photocopies for all her friends and family
and mails it to them with a request for advice.
- Your sister found a list of the 100 most popular baby names on
the
BabyNames.com web site. She posts the list publicly on her
facebook page and asks all her friends to pick their favorite
name. BabyNames.com contains this notice: "All site content
© 1996-2010 BabyNames.com LLC - All Rights Reserved"
- Your sister found this list
of most common first names at
www.namestatistics.com. The site obtained the raw data from the
U.S. Census and put it into a database and displayed it by
frequency. There is no copyright notice on the site. She copies
this list on posts it on her public facebook page. (tricky)
7.
- You decide to create an online version of the "name that tune"
television show. You copy the first five seconds of music from a
large number of popular songs. You put the clips on a web site
where people listen to a randomly chosen clip and try to guess the name
of the song.
- You rent a video with past episodes of "Name that Tune"
television
show, copy several of the shows and post them on your web site.
You don't charge a fee to view them.
8.
- A photograph of Michelle Obama you take from a magazine, scan it,
and modify it with a graphics editing program to make it look like a
superhero,
and post it on your web site. (tricky)
- A photograph of Michelle Obama you take from a magazine, scan it,
and
post a small "thumbnail" image with a reference to the original.
- A photograph you take yourself of Michelle Obama and post it on
your web site.
- You copy this
photograph of Michelle Obama from the White House web site and post
it on your public Facebook page.(tricky)
9.
A national political activist organization created a forum on its
Web site where people were encouraged to post individual newpaper
articles relevant to political issues of concern to the group.
Several articles were reproduced from major newspapers without
permission each day. Thousands of people visited the site on a
daily basis. Participants added comments to the forum, and debate
and discussion of the articles continued. Two newspapers sued the
organization arguing that posting the articles violated their
copyrights.
- Analyze the case, mentioning how the fair-use guidelines
apply. Decide who you think should win the case and briefly
justify your position.
- Imagine a similar but different situation. Imagine the
organization was a group of only twenty people from Cambria and they
posted one article every week. Would this change the way the
fair-use guidelines apply? How? Would you rule the same way in
the case? Explain why.
Homework #9
1. Chapter 4 exercise: 4.23.
Extra Credit Homework
In May of this year, a judge reached a decision in a 4-year old suit by
the
RIAA against LimeWire.
Do some research for news articles about this case to understand the
issues.
Write a short paper
(max 2 pages) that explains what LimeWire is and how it works and why
the
RIAA sued them.
Describe the conclusions that judge reached and his/her justification.
Explain if you think
the ruling is similar to previous cases from the textbook (Napster,
Grokster) or if it
differs in some way. Conclude with the current status of the case. Cite
your references.
Due in class Tue Feb 15.
Homework #10
Read section 4.3.5 in the textbook on the ethical arguments about
copying. Study the list on pages 228-229 of rationalizations
people use to justify
illegal copying of copyrighted materials. Think of another
rationalization you may have heard others (or yourself) use to justify
illegal downloading or copying software like Photoshop. Describe the
rationalization,
then
discuss the counter-argument.
Homework #11
A young writer for the U.K. based paper The Telegraph lists "50
things
that
are being killed by the internet". His tone is
light and he makes numerous references to British pop culture which
many of us in California probably don't understand. Most of the
items are silly or facetious, but a few hint at potentially serious
concerns. Warning: Contains
a
few
adult themes and situations for
the purpose of satire.
Read the article and select three items about which you think we should
be worried that they are disappearing because of the internet. Provide
brief evidence or a short argument to support your opinion for each
one.
Then select three items about which you disagree with the author.
Provide brief evidence or a short argument that they are not
disappearing. (Max 2
pages).
Homework #12
The New York Times online has an interactive feature that
allows you to perform two of the psychological tests Dr. Nass used
in the research described in the readings. For this homework you are
to complete the tests online. You will document the results by
make a screen capture of the results page and printing it out.
If you aren't familiar with taking a screen capture, you should
practice before you begin the
assignment. If you need instructions, you might read these
directions
for Windows XP
and for
Mac
OS.
Before you begin, rate yourself as to how much of a media multi-tasker you
are.
Rate yourself 1 for low and 5 for high. Consider the extent to which you
concurrently use two or more of these media forms: print media,
television, computer-based video (e.g, YouTube), music, nonmusic audio,
video or computer games, voice phone calls, instant messaging,
text messaging, email, web surfing, computer-based applications (such
as word processing).
Here is the page with the two tests.
One is "Test your focus," the other is "Test how fast you juggle tasks."
The tests take only a minute or two. Create a screen capture
of the results for each one and print out both of them.
Staple the pages together. At the top of the first page write
your name and section number. Underneath write
"Multitasking self rating: " and your self-rating number (1 to 5).
Homework #13
Complete the Course Evaluation survey on Blackboard under Assignments.
This survey is anonymous. The instructor is informed only that you submitted it.
He can't see the answers you provided.
This homework is simply scored credit/no credit.
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